


If Life Ain't Just a Joke

by cherryredinfinity (Exotic_Sapphire)



Category: Bandom, Cobra Starship, Fall Out Boy, My Chemical Romance, Panic! at the Disco, Twenty One Pilots
Genre: Alternate Universe - Mutants, Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, Anti-Hero, Blood and Gore, F/M, M/M, Misguided Motives, Multi, Polyamory, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-03-06
Updated: 2016-03-06
Packaged: 2018-05-25 01:18:32
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,451
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6174544
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Exotic_Sapphire/pseuds/cherryredinfinity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Thirty years ago, mutants were only rumored to exist. Now an estimated 1% of the world's population is 'infected' with the mutant genome responsible for, well, superpowers. In a world-wide government race to find a cure, those who display abilities are forced to fight for their right to survive. From anti-mutant laws to being shot down in the streets, its just not a good time to be noticeably different.</p><p>Chicago, home of the largest mutant population in North America, is being overrun by violence with mutants blamed at every turn. It's also attracting blood-hungry criminals from around the world and plenty of interdimensional beings just in case things get boring. Codename Overcast and the Twenty-First Street Pilots are nearly overwhelmed with what passes for peace keeping these days until the so-called cavalry arrive. The Cobras and Killjoys track a drug smuggling ring from New Jersey to Las Vegas, picking up the Vegas Lights on the way, and arrive in Chicago just in time for the biggest shit storm the mutant world has ever seen.</p><p>In this war, no one is a hero.</p>
            </blockquote>





	If Life Ain't Just a Joke

**Author's Note:**

> Title from My Chemical Romance's song 'Dead!'

All Tyler could hear over the rushing of his heart beat in his ears was screaming. He had no idea if it was him or one of the others in the writhing mass of panic. Shots had pierced the calm of the cloudy April day not a minute before and suddenly everyone was running and screaming. Except Tyler, hunched in a ball behind a park bench, head in his hands and rocking back and forth. How the hell did he always end up these situations? Logically speaking, crime was skyrocketing all over Chicago, it was only a matter of time before his bad luck from Columbus caught up with him. Tyler had no time for logic; he had to get something sharp, and fast. 

A man in a camo jacket scrambled over Tyler's bench jumping over Tyler and stumbling away into the bushes. A pocket knife fell out of his jacket as he jumped, landing on the grass not two feet from where Tyler was sitting. He sometimes wondered if it was strictly bad luck that followed him around, maybe it was just chaos. He grabbed the knife, shoving up his left sleeve roughly and placing the tip of the knife on his forearm. Tyler barely dared to breathe, hyperfocusing on the gleaming blade as he made an incision, only big enough to draw a couple drops of thick dark blood. He really needed to drink more water.

"Baal-abaddon," Tyler swallowed thickly, "I'm ready."

Tyler's vision was suddenly filled with red. He jerked his head up to see a lithe figure with enormous flowing robes, red on the ends and graduating up through orange-yellow-white-periwinkle to the brilliantly glowing pantone blue of the figure's close-cropped hair. They leaned down, so far Tyler swore they had to have been at least eight feet tall, void black eyes piercing into Tyler's soul.

Tyler did his best to not shake in terror at the Demon Lord standing in front of him. He vaguely registered that the flagpole a few yards away had stopped shaking in the wind, he could see the flag perfectly frozen in a wave out of the corner of his eye. He hadn't realised that they could stop time, thought, he supposes, it would make sense. He could physically feel the amount of power radiating off the robe, making the whole not shaking in fear thing kind of hard. 

Abaddon withdrew a skeletal hand from their robes, bleach white skin paper thin and stretched taunt over the bones. No fat, and hardly any muscle, could have possibly been underneath that skin, but it felt like Tyler had just jumped into a volcano once the robes were no longer shielding the demonic energy. They slowly placed their hand on Tyler's forehead, thumb and little finger pressing into Tyler's now closed eyelids, the others in a wide triangle. Tyler could feel them digging into his skin like a thousand needles, but at the same time it felt like there was nothing there at all.

Time slowly began to speed back up to normal, until someone screamed and dropped with a sickening crunch on the bench behind Tyler's back. Tyler's eyes snapped open and he was standing up beside the bench, facing the chaotic crowd running in virtual circles, screams escaping every throat as the eight gunmen picked leisurely at the crowd. He felt his face crack into what could only only be described as a psychotic grin. He was now merely a passenger in his body, Abaddon having fully possessed him. Tyler could feel his skin start to crack and splinter as he walked, not even a born demon vessel strong enough to hold one of the seven Lords of Hell. They discarded his jacket, sacrificial wound in his forearm replaced by a large crack, orange living fire spilling out of the rupture.

They stepped out into the crowd, not even having to dodge the roaring masses, everyone somehow unconsciously giving Tyler a wide berth. They strode straight up to the nearest gunman, clad head to toe in black, and politely tapped him on the shoulder. He turned around in confusion only to be greeted with a fist to the face. Tyler watched his hand burst into flames as it completely passed through the man's skull, coming out the other side. What was left of the head soon charred and broke apart dropping the rest of the body on the ground. Tyler couldn't take his eyes off the carmine pool sluggishly gushing out of the mangled stump of what once was a neck.

Abaddon moved again, dragging Tyler along with them. Tyler closed his mind's eyes not wanting to see what destruction the Demon Lord was causing. He could feel the infinite heat of Hellfire on what was left of his skin, so blindingly hot it was ice cold, could see the raging oranges and yellows surely billowing out of him. He wasn't strong enough for white or blue fire, no that would require the removal of Tyler's soul from his body, and he wasn't quite prepared to be stuck as a bodiless entity for the rest of eternity quite yet.

"Tyler?" He suddenly, if very briefly, regained enough motor control to spin around to face the owner of the voice. A man in a camo jacket, grey hoodie pulled so far down Tyler couldn't see his eyes, stood uncertainly about ten feet away.

"Josh Dun," Abaddon said to Tyler, "That's this pest's name." Tyler's stomach dropped. Of course his new roommate of all people would be at the fair today. Josh suddenly moved his hands in front of him defensively as Tyler took a step towards him, fire-swathed hands burning larger and licking at his shoulders.

"No!" Tyler shouted as loudly as was telepathically possible, "He's my friend." Abaddon paused, seeming to consider his words. "We have a deal," Tyler reminded, the flames in his hands receding to settle at his wrists.

"T-t-tyler, what's...What the fuck is going on?" Josh seemed terrified of him, but Tyler guessed he must have looked a bit gruesome - splattered in blood and bits of organs, charred from the heat of his barely held together skin, flames spilling out of every fracture. Tyler had no clue how to answer. How exactly does one explain that they're currently being possessed by a demon?

Abaddon answered for him, "Tyler's not here right now." Tyler wanted to bang his face into a wall. That was the most absolutely cliche horror movie thing that had ever passed his lips. The worst part was it actually worked, Josh talking a giant step backwards, mouth opening and closing like a fish. Tyler sighed as Abaddon turned around as if the situation was completely solved. 

They began powering up for a final attack, the few remaining civilians that hadn't scattered or been previously slaughtered and one last gunman corralled into a ring of fire. Tyler closed his eyes again, he didn't want to know. He was forced to feel the Hellfire surging through his being, starting as a small pinprick of heat in the center of his chest and growing with intensity as it funneled down his arms and out through his palms. He was forced to hear their screams as they were roasted to death like a sickening rendition of the torture of hell itself they would surely face. He was forced to live through this experience every time he was caught up in these situations. They couldn't force him to watch it all happen.

The heat began to die and with it all sound. Soon everything was dead silent. Tyler dared to crack an eye open, only to find himself crouched behind the same bench he was who knows how long ago. Only the bench was half missing and half on fire. Tyler sat frozen for a moment, hearing only the crackling of the bench and very distant sirens. He shot up and off into the trees, running as fast as he possibly could. If he didn't see the total destruction behind him, it was like it never happened. Tyler firmly ignored the black figures he could see pouring towards the fairgrounds, all trying to feed off the remaining chaos energy Abaddon left in their wake. All Tyler had wanted was some goddamned kettle corn. Instead he brings the literal Devil into the physical realm. He wants to die, wants to suffer the punishment he deserves in hell for his crimes, but he can't. That was an arrangement of the deal, Tyler was to be resurrected should he ever die until a permanent way for the demons to access the physical world was found. He wishes he knew he could've said no.


End file.
